pomegranates

I’m at work, greedily eating the seeds of the last pomegranate in Manhattan (so far as I’ve checked below 14th St) and I bid a wistful farewell to pomegranate season. And naturally, I’m thinking about Persephone (who paid dearly for my lunch) and all this leads me here:

PomegranateLouise Glück

First he gave me
his heart. It was
red fruit containing
many seeds, the skin
leathery, unlikely.
I preferred
to starve, bearing
out my training.
Then he said Behold
how the world looks, minding
your mother. I
peered under his arm:
What had she done
with color & odor?
Whereupon he said Now there
is a woman who loves
with a vengeance, adding
Consider she is in her element:
the trees turning to her, whole
villages going under
although in hell
the bushes are still
burning with pomegranates.
At which
he cut one open & began
to suck. When he looked up at last
it was to say My dear
you are your own
woman, finally, but examine
this grief your mother
parades over our heads
remembering
that she is one to whom
these depths were not offered.